Continuous inkjet printing is a printing technology that is well suited for high speed printing applications, having high throughput and low cost per page. Recent advances in continuous inkjet printing technology have included thermally induced drop formation, which is capable of selectively altering the drop breakoff phase relative to a charging electrode waveform or selectively altering the velocity of a pair of drops (one of which is charged and the other uncharged) to cause them to merge, and electrostatic deflection of charged drops to separate the charged non-printing drops from the charged printing drops, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 7,938,516 (Piatt et al.), U.S. Pat. No. 8,382,259 (Panchawagh et al.), U.S. Pat. No. 8,465,129 (Panchawagh et al.), U.S. Pat. No. 8,469,496 (Panchawagh et al.), U.S. Pat. No. 8,585,189 (Marcus et al.), U.S. Pat. No. 8,651,632 (Marcus et al.), U.S. Pat. No. 8,651,633 (Marcus et al.), and U.S. Pat. No. 8,657,419 (Panchawagh et al.), all commonly assigned. These advances have enabled the print resolution to be significantly improved while maintaining the throughput of the printer.
It has been found that under certain printing conditions, print artifacts can be produced. There is a need for a more effective means to prevent the formation of such print artifacts.